Generally, refrigerators are home appliances configured to contain food and drink at lower temperatures inside storage spaces shielded by doors. A refrigerator is configured to contain stored foods and drinks in top shape by cooling the inside of a storage space by using cold air generated through heat exchange with a refrigerant circulating a refrigeration cycle. Recently, the refrigerator is increasing in size, and devices such as home bar, ice maker, shelf, or door box are being installed onto rear surface of the refrigerator door. In this case, when a refrigerator door is closed, shelves or drawers mounted in the storage compartment of the refrigerator body and components mounted on the rear surface of the refrigerator door may interfere with each other.
In order to overcome this interference limitation, the front end portions of the drawers (e.g., shelves or drawers) mounted in the storage compartment (e.g., refrigerating compartment or freezing compartment) are disposed at points away from the front surface of the refrigerator body by a certain distance.
Accordingly, there is inconvenience in that a user needs to dip into the storage compartment to withdraw food and drink stored in the drawer, and it is difficult for a user to check foods stored at the rear side of the storage compartment. These limitations are further intensified as the storage compartment deepens in accordance with the trend of enlargement of the refrigerator.
Various methods have been proposed to improve these limitations. For example, Korean Patent Application Publication No. 2010-0130357 (hereinafter, referred to as Patent 357) discloses a structure in which a shelf or a drawer installed in a refrigerating compartment or a freezing compartment is placed on a storage frame. Here, the front end portion of a multi-joint link is connected to the bottom surface of the refrigerator door, and the rear end portion thereof is connected to the storage frame. Accordingly, when the refrigerator door is rotated and opened, the storage frame moves forward, and the shelf and the drawer move to the front side of the refrigerator.
In this case, the loads of the shelf and the drawer are all delivered to the storage frame. In other words, loads of the shelf and the drawer and loads of foods stored therein are all concentrated on the storage frame. Accordingly, it is important to design the structure of the storage frame so as to sufficiently bear the loads, and thus the structure of the storage frame becomes complicated, and the volume there of increases. Accordingly, the weight of the storage frame itself becomes heavier, and the space occupied by the storage frame increases, thereby causing a reduction of the capacity of storage compartment.
Also in case of Patent 357, since the link moving the storage frame in linkage with the door is connected to the bottom surface of the storage frame, the point of application of a force applied through the link is located on the bottom surface of the door, but the center of gravity of the drawer is concentrated on a side higher than the bottom surface of the storage frame. Thus, the line of action of a force by the link and the line of action of an inertial force by the drawer do not exist on the same line, causing a bending moment or a shearing force to act on the storage frame and thus causing a deformation, which is intensified as the weight of stored foods in the drawer increases. Particularly, in case of Patent 357, since the load of the drawer is supported by the storage frame, the load of drawer becomes a cause that further promotes the deformation of the storage frame in addition to the inertia of the drawer.
Also, in case of Patent 357, for smooth withdrawal of the storage frame, the rail that supports the storage frame needs to be maintained so as to operate normally. In this case, there are many practical limitations in designing the rail that can sufficiently bear the load acting from the storage frame in a determined standard.
Also, in a structure in which all loads applied from the storage frame are concentrated on the rail, the storage frame may easily wobble during the movement. When this wobbling lasts and thus the rail or the storage frame is deformed, the movement operation of the storage frame cannot be stably performed.
Japanese Patent Application Publication No. JP2004-93039A (hereinafter, referred to as Patent 039) discloses a refrigerator in which a shelf disposed in a storage compartment is connected to a door by an arm and the shelf is withdrawn by the arm when the door is opened. Particularly, the arm is directly connected to the shelf. Accordingly, in order to together withdraw a plurality of shelves in linkage with the door, the arms are also provided in plurality, and the respective arms are connected to shelves.
Also, since the arm needs to be installed to correspond to the height of the shelf, the installation location of the arm is limited. Particularly, most part of the arm connected to the shelf located in the middle of the storage compartment is inevitably exposed to a user.
Also, in Patent 357 and Patent 039, the structure of the storage frame is exposed in the storage compartment as it is. Thus, the exterior is not good, and the storage space decreases by a space occupied by the storage frame. In addition, the circulation of chilly air in the storage compartment is interrupted by the storage frame.
Also, although a user does not desire a function of automatically withdrawing the drawer, he/she cannot select whether or not to use the automatic withdrawal function.
In addition, a typical refrigerator is provided with a gasket disposed on the rear surface of the door to maintain airtightness of the storage compartment. When the door is closed, the gasket adheres closely to the cabinet. In a typical refrigerator, the storage frame (or drawer) is withdrawn simultaneously with opening of the door. Accordingly, when a user opens the door that is closed, a force for separating the gasket from the cabinet and a force for withdrawing the storage frame are simultaneously needed, making it difficult to open the door.